tuntemansa

Tuntemansa is a Finnish grammatical construction used to express “the thing he knows” or “the knowledge possessed by someone.” It is formed by attaching a possessive suffix -nsa to a participial stem related to the verb tuntea (to know) and is typically used to modify a following noun in the genitive, producing phrases such as tuntemansa totuuden (the truth he knows) or tuntemansa asian (the matter he knows).

Usage and nuance: It functions as a relative modifier that attributes knowledge to the subject of the sentence. The form is most common in formal or written Finnish and appears in clauses like tuntemansa totuuden mukaan (according to the truth he knows) or tuntemansa asian ratkaiseminen (the solving of the matter he knows). It can convey that the referenced information originates from the subject’s own knowledge, rather than from others’ statements.

Examples:

- Hän kertoi tuntemansa totuuden. (He told the truth he knows.)

- Tuntemansa totuuden mukaan hän teki päätöksen. (According to the truth he knows, he made a decision.)

- Tuntemansa asian ratkaiseminen vei aikaa. (Solving the matter he knows took time.)

Tuntemansa forms part of a broader pattern in Finnish that uses possessive participles to create nominalized relative clauses, allowing speakers to credit knowledge or information to a specific subject without repeating names.